


The Last Wall

by DevineMandate



Category: Cormoran Strike Series - Robert Galbraith
Genre: Post-Troubled Blood
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-29
Updated: 2021-02-02
Packaged: 2021-03-15 23:27:30
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 6,914
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29072526
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DevineMandate/pseuds/DevineMandate
Summary: So close they can taste it, but not there yet!
Comments: 42
Kudos: 46





	1. Chapter 1

Robin had never liked the expression “You could cut the tension with a knife”. She understood the idea, obviously, that something so insubstantial could become so intense it was made corporeal. But this metaphor didn’t get at the essence of tension, in Robin’s opinion; its invisibility was one of its primary qualities, it was a thing unseen and unheard but constantly felt. Tension wasn’t a cake to be sliced ( _or an arm_ she thought, glancing at the scar from her second encounter with a murderous, monstrous man--it was unfortunate that if someone referenced an attack on her, she could respond “Which one?”, but she wouldn’t have it any other way--she had more or less volunteered for all but the first).

For Robin, a better metaphor for tension was heavy humidity. Everywhere and nowhere, suffocating you, hard to move through, making every effort that much more sweat soaked. You couldn’t cut it with a knife, but it could leave you unable to breathe properly.

Robin had been tense for a _long_ time now.

On her 30th birthday, Strike had been a perfect gentleman. More gentlemanly than Robin might have desired in the end, but it had been a wonderful evening: more doors opening, more walls crashing down, with less restraint and caution than even the night he’d blacked her eyes and they’d declared their intense, reciprocal affection for one another.

Robin stared across the desk at Strike, who was concentrating on his computer, the two of them alone in the office near the end of the day. There were nearly no walls between them anymore. Conversation was easy, company was restful, working together was often joy itself. Almost nothing was taboo: she knew so much more about his childhood, about Charlotte, about his military experience. Their mutual delight in each other’s company was evident to everyone around them, and to each other. It was...wonderful. They had a friendship so deep and true; she had nothing else in her life to compare it to, nothing even close.

But still, here they were, six months after her birthday, five years on from their collision on the staircase, and the tension would not ease. There was one barricade standing, and the standoff between them to see who would breach it, if anyone, was both obviously mutual and seemingly eternal. She pictured each of them on either side of a thin wall, each with a sledgehammer in hand, Strike saying “You go”, Robin saying “No, you go first”.

But what if it ruined everything? They had worked so hard to get here, to this personal and professional peak. What if it collapsed in rubble within a few months, all because their bodies yearned to be close to one another? Was it really worth it...just to find out how his stubble would feel on her neck, her breast, her stomach, between her thighs? Just to find out how he would look at her when his guard was completely down? Just to find out if his physical...gifts...were part of what gave him such apparent sexual prowess? Just to find out what it would be like to hold him, naked in the dark, and whisper “I love you” and hear him say, unflinchingly, “I love you too, Robin”?

Maybe it would be worth it...maybe even if they didn’t last, she would know true passion, and the bottomless depths of comfort they could give to one another...even for just a little while, maybe it would be worth it... 

_Sod off, Ellacott, you bloody softie. You love each other openly in every way but that one. Isn’t that enough?_

_No…never enough..._

“All right, Robin?” said Strike. Then, when she didn’t respond for a few seconds, he smiled and said: “Earth to Ellacott, we are awaiting your transmission, over.”

“Sorry,” she said, dragging herself fully out of the reverie. “Yes, I’m all right, just thinking about…” She reached for a topic that would justify the intensity of her brooding but perhaps not invite much more conversation, and found it quickly, grateful. “Matthew.”

“Oh,” said Strike, his face twisting with disgust. “Him.” Silence for a few seconds and then: “Twat.”

Robin laughed. “Yeah, that’s established, I think.”

Strike stood up quickly, as though he wanted to run away from even the topic of Matthew, saying “I’m going to run down the…”, but what he was going to say, she would never know. Strike made a false step and his prosthetic leg slipped out from under him, and he tumbled, headlong and hard, to the floor.

“Fuuuuuuuuuuck!” he screamed, writhing, grabbing at both the inside of his left thigh and his left knee. “Oh fuuuuuuuck, it hurts!”

Fretting would not help him, so when his screams stopped, she said calmly: “Cormoran, what can I do?”

Strike was silent for perhaps thirty seconds, managing the pain and calming himself down, his breathing slowing. Then he said, “Will you help me to get up...please?”

“Of course, what do you think is the best way?” Even this was a sign of their closeness. He’d have stubbornly got himself up, wretched with pain, before, maybe even snapped at her to fuck off. Now he had let her in, even here, where his pride and dignity had previously locked her out.

“I’m going to try to grab the, ow...the side of the desk and get myself up that way. Could you get behind me and try to haul me up from under my armpits? At least until I have control of myself.”

Robin wordlessly got behind Strike’s shoulders and crouched, and got the crooks of her elbows under the crooks of his armpits, and heaved. Strike scrabbled for the side of the desk, and shoved down with his hand, adding momentum to his ascent. As they stood up fully, Robin felt her breasts make incidental contact with his back, and moved away from him as soon as she was sure he wouldn’t fall down, as though his back had burned her chest.

Even though she knew he was in pain, a small part of her thought _When he felt me pressed against him...did he like it?...I liked it._

“All right, thank you,” said Strike. “I’m going to get over to the farting couch, can I use you for support for just a few more seconds?”

She slipped under one of his arms, and he leaned on and against her, and now the incidental contact was against his side. He hobble-hopped over to the couch. “Help me get down slow,” he said. She held him under the elbows as he gingerly lowered himself, sighing sounds mixing with farting sounds.

“Thanks, Robin. I think it might not be as bad as I thought, just scared myself. Probably shouldn’t be running any marathons or anything, but I think I’ll manage.”

Robin lowered herself onto the couch near him, but not so near that there was any more incidental contact. “London Marathon’s still a few months away, I’m pretty sure you can rehab in time to pursue your dream.”

Strike smiled and then said, the seriousness of his tone contrasting with the expression on his face, “Thank you, Robin.”

Then he reached for her hand and she gave it to him. For a few seconds, that was all, but then Strike began moving his fingers lightly, sliding over her palm and up to her fingertips, then down to brush against her wrist, taking her breath away. He locked eyes with her, then brought her hand to his lips and kissed first the back of it, and then turned it over to kiss the inside of her wrist, where he’d stroked before. Now she gasped, shivering. Was this how it happened? Was this the way the wall came down?

_Just jump, you can do it, jump off the cliff...and find out if you can fly._

“Cormoran, are you…”

Neither of them had heard anyone coming, but there was a loud rap on the frosted glass of the door to their office.

“We’re closed!” barked Strike, clearly aggrieved at having a precious moment shattered.

But neither of them had locked up, and the door flew open with a bang, and there, framed in the doorway, was Charlotte Campbell, the ugly sneer on her face doing nothing to mar her breathtaking beauty.


	2. Chapter 2

Robin and Strike released their hands from one another, Strike’s flying to his pocket, Robin’s to her lap. They scooted a little further apart, but not before Charlotte had taken in the initial tableau...Robin’s and Strike’s startled faces and entwined hands.

“Drat, I’m ruining an intimate moment. I honestly, truly hope it wasn’t THAT intimate, or I might have made this trip for nothing.” Charlotte took a few steps into the room as she spoke.

“WHAT the FUCK are YOU doing here?” spat Strike. “Get out!” Though Robin was reeling from Charlotte’s entrance, there was a little room left in her head to enjoy the finality of Strike’s tone.

“Here to make you an offer, Bluey,” said the unabashed Charlotte. “One I’m pretty sure you can’t refuse, as they say.” She focused on Robin. “Wonderful to finally meet you in person. You have a lovely voice and manner on the phone, Robin. And such a pretty girl, too. Your exploits make it obvious you have brains. The whole package.”

“Fucking CHRIST!”

“Now, now, Corm, just hear me out for two minutes, and I think you’ll both agree it’s in your best interests.”

“I don’t want to hear anything you have to say ever again! Is this your idea of how to win me back? Because that’s never happening.”

Charlotte laughed so hard it was just shy of a cackle. “Good lord, Bluey,” she said, wiping her eyes. “Do you really think I’m that deluded? No, no, I know we’re over. It’s a shame, though...you’re irreplaceable in bed--he really is, you know,” she said as an aside to Robin, in a stage whisper. “Amazing kisser, generous lover, incredible stamina, so attentive, really great at oral, my knees were literally always weak afterward, quivering from all the orgasms, cock like a bull.”

Robin spoke for the first time since Charlotte’s entrance. “Stop it!” she shouted. “What do you want?”

“Ah, yes, that’s the real question, isn’t it? It’s simple, really. I want you both to come with me somewhere. I have something to show you.”

“Why should we go anywhere with you?” Robin asked.

“Oh, I’ve been so looking forward to telling you why.” She leered at them, leaning forward slightly. “If you don’t come with me, I will throw every ounce of my financial weight toward making sure your agency goes bankrupt.”

Strike paled and Robin must have blanched as well. “On what grounds?” said Strike.

“Bluey, don’t be naive. I have so many millions I don’t know what to do with them and all the time in the world.”

“Skived off motherhood, have you?” said Robin.

“Oh, yes! Everyone thinks the arrangement is better; I think even the children appreciate it more without me there, can’t say I blame them. I’m a terrible mother! But never mind me, this is about you: I don’t know just this moment how I’d sink your venture, but it would be easier than it should be and I’d buy others’ time to make it happen with very little effort from my end. Maybe I’ll bury you in frivolous litigation so that your funds run dry. Maybe I’ll start a new agency across the street with the most renowned detectives from all over the world. It would be fun to figure out how to strangle you slowly or crush you quickly, but I’m a reasonable woman, and I’m offering you a very good bargain. Come with me, give me maybe an hour of your time, and I will never interfere in either of your lives ever again.”

Strike scowled. “Bollocks. You’ll just begin your revenge tour whether we come with you or not.”

“Corm, I’m surprised at you! I’m petty, vindictive, and spiteful, not pathetic!”

“Could have fooled me,” said Robin.

Charlotte turned her glare upon the other woman. “All I want is my pound of flesh. I don’t want to hound you both your whole lives to get that flesh if I don’t have to. Don’t make me bore myself that way just to chastise you properly. I just want you to come look at something. No violence upon anyone, no poison, no physical harm whatsoever, just need you to watch.”

Strike and Robin looked into each other’s eyes and instantly knew they were of one mind.

“Sod off, Charlotte,” said Strike. “Do your worst and we’ll see who has the stomach for it.”

Charlotte closed her eyes and nodded. “All right, Corm,” she said, seeming to adopt a reasonable tone. “I really didn’t want it to come to this, but if you won’t come, I’ll not only bury your agency. I’ll bury your friend Shanker as well.”

Strike seemed to visibly deflate, his eyes radiating disbelief, his mouth agog. “Charlotte...not even you…”

“Shut up, Bluey!” said Charlotte, with sudden vehemence. “He wouldn’t even be missed. It’d be easy to see it was a bit of gang violence. Risks come with his career choice, don't they? Occupational hazard. Don’t think I have the stomach for _that_? Are you willing to bet Shanker’s life on it?”

Strike put his head in his hands, then spoke through the small gap where his nose and mouth were visible: “And I put myself through all of this...blind, I was.”

He raised his head. “Robin, I’m sorry…”

“It’s okay, Cormoran,” she said.

Charlotte spoke again. “I meant what I said. I won’t visit either of you or ever impinge on your lives or your agency ever again after this. I know I’m broken the way I love you, Bluey, but I do. I do love you. That’s why I need you to see...what I’ll show to you.”

“Fuck,” said Strike. “Out of your fucking mind.”

“That’s irrelevant. Get up, both of you, and get in the car downstairs.”

“Charlotte, he just injured himself a few minutes ago!” said Robin. “Please…”

“Don’t talk to ME about his injury! Didn’t I pick him up when he fell down re-learning how to walk? Didn’t he lean on me and get succor from me just when he needed it the most? I sacrificed my LIFE for him, for MONTHS. I proved my love EVERY DAY!" Robin thought of Matt and her recovery from the attack, his belief that this one act of kindness in the distant past put her eternally in his debt.

"Screw your bloody leg, Corm, get the fuck up, and limp your arse to the car downstairs.”

Robin and Strike got up and went downstairs, Charlotte in their wake.

They were unable to see the limo’s driver, but the car started off, and Robin took Strike’s hand, and squeezed supportively.

“It really is good you two have one another to rely on,” said Charlotte, eyeing their held hands.

“Where are we going, Charlotte?” said Strike.

“The cinema,” she replied.

It burst out of Robin before she could stop herself. “You’re taking the piss!”

“Oh no no no no, no joke,” said Charlotte. She flashed a large, beatific smile. “Private screening.”

The car rolled on through the deepening darkness.


	3. Chapter 3

“Some of this might be...uncomfortable. Eyes and ears open and focused on the screen, mouths shut, or no bargain,” said Charlotte, as they pulled into the cinema’s empty multi storey car park, just off a busy road. “Rented the whole place out.”

Robin was going through the worst possibilities of what she was about to see...a snuff film, like the one Strike had seen during the Bamborough investigation? She very seriously doubted it. It didn’t seem Charlotte’s style, though Robin had never assumed her capable of threatening Shanker’s life until tonight, either. Charlotte and Strike having sex? That seemed fairly likely and perfectly in keeping with the Charlotte she’d met tonight. What else might Charlotte use? Security footage of Strike somewhere awkward like a strip club or pornography shop? She started to tremble with nerves, her stomach flipping over and over like she was about to skydive, imagining how Charlotte wanted to make them react, and what she might expose or display to hurt them.

The limo stopped very near the pedestrian entrance, and the three of them went inside.

“Rearmost screen,” said Charlotte, guiding them through the dimly lit and eerily empty cinema. It was a large building with an odd echo--the walls, floor and ceiling sending their footsteps back to them--and it took a couple of minutes to walk to their destination.

Strike and Robin spoke softly to one another as they walked through the auditorium door and the enormous screen loomed. “Whatever this is Robin, don’t rise to the bait, try to let it roll off if you can.”

“I know. You too.” She gave his arm what she hoped was a bracing squeeze, and started up the stairs Charlotte was already climbing.

Charlotte led them to a pair of seats at the center of the auditorium, flanked by containers of popcorn ( _more of that classic Charlotte humor_ thought Robin) that neither of them touched. Once they sat down, Charlotte moved down two rows and stood standing and facing them, grinning.

“Remember,” she said, her tone warm with glee and hate, “eyes and ears open, no talking.” Then a shout: “Roll ‘em!”

Someone must have been ready at their post because the already dim lights faded to nothing and the whirring sound of film projection equipment started.

Immediately Charlotte and Strike were onscreen, naked and conjoined in a large, plush bed, viewed at a short distance from the side.

A brief, disgusted growling sound came out of the Strike sitting next to her, but Robin did not flinch. It was not easy to watch, and the enthusiasm of their faces and sounds, particularly his, were demoralising, but she had more or less prepared for this. In fact, she thought, this did nothing to diminish her opinion that Charlotte was pathetic. If this was the worst she could do, she had nothing to hurt Robin with.

Robin’s eyes were drawn to Strike’s hairy body. He was even more animalistic in his hairiness than she’d imagined. Robin did her best to obliterate the onscreen Charlotte from her sensory intake, and just look at Strike for a moment. _Think of it being you instead_ said some depraved part of her, and for an infinitesimal fragment of a second, Robin felt awkwardly excited. She could almost see the woman’s hair turn from black to ruddy blonde, see the waist and bust swell to Robin’s size, hear her own voice shouting his name as they moved together.

Then disgust returned in full force, and Robin tasted a soupcon of the dissociation she’d felt in her mind and body while she’d been assaulted the first time, trying her best to think of nothing, to be empty of thought and feeling. It was nightmarish.

The image changed without warning, and Robin instantly recognized the location. She felt her stomach drop like a lift cable had snapped and she was plummeting.

It was the exterior of the Ritz. As sweat broke out on Robin’s arms and neck, the door of the Ritz opened and there were Robin and Strike, both soused, giggly, and stumbling. They made it to the side of the kerb, and then the image zoomed in closer. On one side of the screen was Strike unsuccessfully hailing a cab. On the other side was Robin laughing very hard, the sound distant and mostly muffled by traffic. Strike failed once again to get a taxi, and the Robin on screen watched him, her laughter subsiding, and the camera zoomed in on her face. Strike’s head entered the frame as he leaned next to her and whispered into her ear, and the onscreen Robin’s eyes widened with obvious joy. The joy of his aftershave tickling her nose, and the slightest touch of his arm on her shoulder, and the vibration of his deep, deep voice so close to her ear. The present day Robin felt an unpleasant sensation all over her skin, as though pins were jabbing her everywhere just hard enough to poke but not stab.

“Where did you get this?” said Strike, and Robin hated the breathy, fearful quality in his voice.

“Mitch Patterson,” said Charlotte, sharply. “Now be quiet.”

The image changed again, and they were outside Robin’s place during a different evening, Robin and Strike parting with a swift hug after Strike finished his cigarette. Onscreen Robin stared after him as he walked away down the pavement. The camera closed in on Robin as in the previous shot, taking Strike out of the frame as he raised his arm in farewell. The screen filled up with Robin’s face, and she watched Strike walking away for a long time with self-evident melancholy and desire, literally sighing at one point. Current Robin thought onscreen Robin looked like a lovesick adolescent, and real fear swooped into her brain, like a rush of foul-smelling wind.

The next shot was through Robin’s bedroom window on another evening. Robin sat at her desk and put her head down onto her arms in the stereotypical gesture of the suffering or lovelorn. A few seconds later, she sat up suddenly and reached into a drawer and pulled out two sheets of lilac paper and a pen.

Robin-in-the-cinema suddenly knew what onscreen Robin was up to, and she let out an involuntary high pitched whine like a dog. Charlotte caught her eye and grinned. “Eye on the ball, Robin.”

Robin looked back up and the past version of herself was writing on the paper, and the camera zoomed in and she could make out what she'd written thus far.

_Dear Cormoran,_

_I tried to tell myself_

Before Robin wrote any more, it cut to her shoving the lilac papers into a vent in her bedroom and screwing it shut.

Then the shot changed for the last time to the coup de grace: Charlotte was standing naked against a white background, two lilac sheets of paper in her hand.

"Noooo!" screamed Robin, beside herself, her blood frozen in her veins, and her voice was despair itself. 

"Shhhh, this is the good part…unless you want Shanker to rot."

The Charlotte on the screen--holding the papers so as to obscure her caesarean scar and expose everything else--started reading the letter that documented Robin's innermost thoughts about Cormoran. Robin turned instantly from cold to hot, her skin scarlet within seconds. She felt glad she had to look at the screen and not Strike. As Charlotte went on reading, Robin slumped and sank into the seat, her head lowering but her eyes always up, as though trying to protect her head with her shoulders like a turtle, as though she wanted to sink into the floor or become part of the chair or evaporate into nothingness.

Charlotte was a good actress, and she didn't mock the material, but delivered it with gusto and no affectation, and that made the whole thing even more grotesque and obscene. 

_Dear Cormoran,_

_I tried to tell myself it wasn’t love, after you held me on those stairs in my wedding gown. I tried for a very long time to tell myself that it was just gratitude and friendly affection, and that when we held each other, it didn’t feel at all like I’d come home, and that neither of us thought about running away together in that moment. I can still feel your heartbeat pounding between us._

_I’ve been in love with you for such a long time now. It took me more than a year after my divorce to admit it to myself, but I’ve loved you since long before that. I respect you so much. You’ve never seemed to believe that being a woman would hold me back in any way, even after you learned about my history. You’ve never, not even once, tried to use your size to intimidate me in an argument, or made me feel uncomfortable sexually. I know what a rare and impressive man you are, Strike. You make most men look like boys._

_The night of that disastrous party at Max’s place, I was afraid I’d done permanent damage to our relationship calling you out on some of the things that happened that night. Instead, you apologised sincerely to me, and didn’t try to tell me that I had any share of the blame. It’s not just that...I don’t want to be conceited, but I think you changed for me after that night, because of that night. I didn’t ask you to, but you started being nice to Pat. You treated my birthday with respect when it came around again. You acknowledged the profundity of our relationship after all these years, that night you gave me two black eyes, and you did it voluntarily. I thought you were so brave. It made me so happy._

_Cormoran, do you have any idea how different all of that is from Matthew? He usually remembered to get me a decent gift when the big occasions came, but I see now he was always trying to make me less than, to keep me in my place. When I think of how I’d have stayed with him for all these years...if I hadn’t come to your office to temp that week...I shudder imagining it. He tried to stop me from growing into my most authentic self, while you encouraged me to change and follow my bliss. He took me for granted. You don’t. It means everything._

_I think one day one of us will be brave, and say the words or start the kiss that will take us into another stage of our relationship. Not yet, I can’t summon the courage, but I think one day. Will it be you or me? But even if that day never comes, you are still the love of my life. I have never had more faith in anyone, no one on Earth. I yearn and ache for you. Every day is the best day because you are there, and the hardest day because you are just out of reach. I want you, I love you, you are my best friend._

_With all my heart,  
Robin_

The film stopped and the lights came up.

Nothing happened for a few seconds. Robin sat hunched, Strike sat wide-mouthed, and Charlotte beamed devilishly.

“Now!” said Charlotte, breaking the spell, “Shanker’s life was worth that, wasn’t it?”

Robin sat, her mind trying to do the right thing.

 _Don’t give her anything, don’t do anything, don’t say anything, just let it go_.

But Strike said heavily, “Robin.”

Robin rose to her feet and wailed wordlessly for several seconds before she turned on Charlotte. “YOU ROTTEN WOMAN! YOU BITCH! WHY! WHY! WHY!” She wasn’t crying yet, but it wouldn’t be long.

“ _Because_ ,” said Charlotte, as she might have explained that one and one make two, “at BEST, I’ve made it impossible for the two of you to work with each other, and at WORST, I’ve driven you together but taken away the chance for you to pour your heart out. But that was really collateral damage. More importantly, I’ve made it so that Corm can’t hear it from you when it’s the first time. I’m done with you two now, though. How could I ever top it?”

“YOU THIEF! YOU MONSTER!”

Robin took in Charlotte’s evil smirk and Strike’s sympathetic, stricken face, and it was too much. She tried not to run, but it was like attempting to stop the sun from rising.

“ROBIN!” shouted Strike, but Robin could not heed. She sobbed over and over again, trailing tears behind her as she ran.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So yeah, that was the meanest thing I could think of. It might take me a while to do justice to the end, but I want to make enduring this chapter worth it...


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I just wanted to say I’ve very obviously stolen a lot of JKR’s phrasing / expressions / metaphors throughout this story.

Robin was still crying fifteen minutes later as the cab pulled up to the office. Strike had been sending text after text and had tried to call twice, but she had not responded, far too embarrassed and depressed to face him.

**Robin, I’ve just got in a cab, where are you going? The office? Home?**

**Please, Robin, talk to me, this is what Charlotte wants to happen.**

**I’m your friend, Robin. I’ll find you even if you don’t respond. Not a threat, just a promise.**

**Just don’t run away from me, please.**

She didn’t think she could feel much worse (only mortal danger and agoraphobia had made her feel worse than she felt now), but Strike’s “I’m your friend” had managed to lower her spirits slightly further, her attitude hitting bedrock and then digging.

“Wait here, please, I’ll be right back,” she said thickly to the driver, who had been kindly ignoring her anguish. She was only at the office to run upstairs and grab her bag, which she had thoughtlessly left behind when Charlotte had spirited them away.

She forced herself to sprint up the stairs through her misery and shame and distress, and grabbed the purse and plunged down the stairs again, desperate to make sure Strike would not get back before she left.

She had just exited the building when a taxi came round the corner, tyres squealing with the velocity of the turn, at the other end of the street. Robin flew toward her own cab, but couldn’t quite get to the door before Strike was emerging from his taxi, limping at speed toward her.

“Robin, don’t go, talk to me please!”

Robin opened the door of the cab and threw herself inside.

“Please, Robin, ow! Fucking leg!”

She had just shut the door when Strike’s scream pierced the air.

“OH SHIT, I’VE REALLY BUGGERED IT! OH FUUUUUUCK! ROBIN!”

The car started to drive off, and then Strike’s booming yell sounded one more time, desperate:

“ROBIN, HELP! MY LEG! HELP!”

She looked back and saw Strike shuddering with pain on the ground, his pleading eyes watching the receding cab’s rear lights. Inside Robin, shame and desperation warred briefly with loyalty and pity.

“Stop,” said Robin, embittered but unable to not help Strike.

She paid the driver, and got out, and sprinted toward Strike as hard as she’d sprinted away before.

“Oh Jesus Christ, thank you, Robin,” said Strike as she drew near. “Thank you.”

“Let’s get you upstairs,” she said, keen not to discuss anything that had happened in the last hour.

“Right, help me…”

It took the better part of ten minutes to get Strike up the first set of stairs. His injury seemed to be nearly the worst Robin had seen him endure before.

“I don’t think I can manage going up to the flat yet, but A & E won’t tell me anything I don’t already know,” said Strike, speaking to Robin for the first time since she’d helped him up. “Can you just get me into the office and help me get sorted a bit?”

Robin sighed in agreement, and helped Strike to the couch. He said: “Ice pack, freezer upstairs. Paracetamol too, please. And some whisky if you don’t mind.”

Robin gathered all of these things--the very worst of her feelings dissipating with the necessity of taking care of Strike--and brought them to him, and he knocked back the double whisky and the paracetamol instantly.

He was quiet after the drink, as he looked at Robin standing near, and then: “Robin, I’ll make sure Charlotte pays for what she did.”

“Ergh, never mind all that, Cormoran, I don’t want to get into some kind of escalating retaliation situation with your ex-girlfriend.”

“No, I mean she’s going to jail. I snagged one of those mini-cams you thought were such a good idea on our way out,” he said, pointing at a black dot smaller than Robin’s fingertip attached to his breast pocket. “Everything from the car trip forward is on video. She at least solicited a burglary...wonder if it qualifies for indecent exposure,” he said, with a grim smile. “We’ll have to keep an eye on her when she gets out, of course, but prison will probably make her think twice about pulling a stunt like this again.”

“Oh...well, that’s good to hear!" said Robin, her mood now almost neutral. "Well, if you’re all right, I’m going to go. Thank you for not saying anything awful or making this day worse. Let’s just get on with life like today never happened, and…”

“Robin,” said Strike. “Sit by me.” It was not quite either a request or an order, more like a gentle but emphatic invitation. Something in his voice compelled Robin to do as he’d asked.

“Thank you, Robin,” said Strike warmly, and he reached for her hand. Robin hesitated, and then gave it to him.

 _Deja vu_ , thought Robin.

Strike stroked the palm of her hand, and slid his fingers up to her fingertips, and down to her wrist. Then he raised the back of her hand to his mouth, and looked into her eyes, and turned her hand over to kiss the inside of her wrist just as he had a little over an hour ago, sending the same electric shock through her as before.

 _Oh my god…_ thought Robin, startled and happy. _He’s brought us back here, he’s brought us back to where we were before she came in._

“Cormoran… _are_ you…?” she said, throwing her own effort into re-creating the earlier scene.

“I’m so fucking petrified right now, Robin,” said Strike, and he let out a huff of breath. “I know I don’t have any right to be scared like this after what you just went through. I also know I can’t make it all the way right, but let me at least do this anyway.” He let go of her hand, and pulled out his phone and tapped a couple of times on the screen. “Wrote most of this before, but had to write the end and make some adjustments between texts to you in the cab.”

Robin’s jaw worked to keep her from crying immediately.

“Here goes,” said Strike, with the air of a man who has placed his life savings on a roll of the dice.

_Dear Robin,_

_I love you. There’s so much more to say. I’ll try._

_The very first thing you did when I met you was save me from myself, stopping me from running after Charlotte like a plonker. All apologies to you and your left breast for that moment. Hopefully after all we’ve been through, it was worth it._

_The first time you took off your coat in this office, it was too late for me, it was inevitable. That jumper should be illegal. And that bloody green dress. And that blue one you wore on your last birthday. I guess it’s you that should be illegal, not the clothes._

_Your beauty is spectacular, Robin, but it is nothing compared to your intelligence, your sense of justice, and your generous heart. I am so grateful for your friendship, and I hope that even if you don’t feel the same way, we can stay friends. I’d never find a best mate that could approach you, so take pity on a poor, pathetic amputee, and stay even if you don’t love me that way. There’s no one else on this earth who can make me laugh like you do or make such easy conversation or make me take care of myself when I want to push too hard. Jesus, you’re wonderful._

_I think I know the moment when I knew I was in love with you. Like you, I tried to deny it for a long, long time after I knew...but it was on the way back from that trip to Devon, the trip where you drove like an F1 driver and saved our lives. There was a moment when we both knew that you weren’t going to make it to the train and Masham if you dropped me off. When I made the decision to get you there at all costs, knowing the car would be undriveable for me (yeah, I paid several hundred pounds in fees, don’t worry about it)--that was when I knew. There was no hesitation or resentment or irritation or any other Charlotte-related feelings, just the will to do what needed to happen for you to be right with yourself and your family._

_On that note, I have a confession to make. Well, another one, anyway. Do you know what I thought when you told me that Matt’s mum had died? I thought, with happiness in tow: “They’ll have to postpone the wedding.”_

_Robin, I hoped so deeply and for so long that you wouldn’t get married. Talk about the worst experiences of my life. Watching you dance with Matthew at your wedding instantly entered the “Cormoran Strike’s Shit Experiences” hall of fame, and it is a crowded fucking field._

_But at least that horrible memory was followed by one of the best I have. In the moment of hugging you, I was so at peace and happy, Robin. I don’t believe in mystical bullshit, but when I held you, it truly, honestly felt as though I’d held you before, but a long time ago. Like I’d been reunited with my--well, my soulmate, I guess, though “soulmate” is one of those words people toss around so it becomes cheap and loses any meaning. When I say it felt like I’d been reunited with my SOULMATE, I mean it. Letting you go was awful, but I have always treasured that hug._

_You’re right, Robin, I did change for you, like bloody Mr. Darcy for Elizabeth. No one else, certainly none of the women I’ve dated, could have changed me. But you didn’t demand it, you just told me what I was doing wrong. I _want_ to be the man who’s worthy of you._

_I’m so sorry for what Charlotte did. Those words are inadequate to express the depth of pain I feel; she knew that’s what I’d hate the most. Seeing you tortured like that was another of the worst experiences of my life--somewhere between getting blown up and your dance with Matthew...I guess you can be glad you’re in such hallowed company? Sorry, it’s really not funny, but I want to make it clear how much you mean to me, and I want you to know that your pain is my pain. I hope I can make it up to you one day._

_Charlotte tried to steal something from us, but she can’t have it, I won’t let her. Let me give it back to you. Let me hold you, let me kiss you. Let me tell you how much I love you. If you can’t do that, then just stay. It would be hard to live that way, but it would be enough._

_With all my heart,  
Cormoran_

Robin felt like sunshine had dismissed the clouds in her heart. She wiped the streams of tears from her cheeks, and smiled at him, unable to properly express her gratitude and elation. Then something came together for her.

“Strike, is your leg actually hurt?”

Strike cast his eyes down. “Not really.” He looked up, his eyes wide, begging her to understand. “I needed you to stay. Couldn’t think of anything else in the moment that would definitely stop you from leaving.”

“So you used my better nature against me,” said Robin, but she was laughing and wiping her eyes again.

“Does it count as ‘against you’ at this point, really? Can’t we say I used your better nature ‘for you’ instead?”

Robin laughed, and then, “How did you get to the office so quickly just now? No offence, but I can run faster than you, so I had a significant head start.”

Strike smiled. “Chasing the love of your life is a great incentive. Had plenty of cash in my wallet. Promised the cabbie two hundred quid if he got to the office inside of 10 minutes.”

“Two hundred fucking quid?” said Robin.

Strike shrugged. “It was worth it.”

Robin made a sound that was halfway between a gasp and a sob, and whispered, “Oh, _Cormoran_.”

As with their first embrace, neither of them knew who made the initial move or if it was a simultaneous decision. Had Strike pulled Robin down or had Robin fallen onto Strike? All they knew was that Robin was lying on top of Cormoran and they were kissing gently.

Robin felt Strike’s hand slide over her cheek and into her hair, her skin practically lighting up as he touched her. He moved his fingers in her hair, playing with it as his lips brushed and pressed against hers, and Robin felt like the top of her head might lift away from her, so much happiness and lust was pulsing through her.

A few minutes later, they were kissing less gently, and a few minutes later, the touching had escalated to the point where tension must be released.

“Robin, will you...come upstairs with me?”

Robin put her hand on his chest. The pounding there took her back once more to their first hug, to the moment her feelings had burst the dam.

“With all my heart, Cormoran.”

Robin and Strike climbed the stairs toward Strike’s flat, sledgehammers in hand to knock down the last wall.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I think the scenario depicted in this story might be a bit extreme/OOC, but my current thinking is Book 6 will be the “Everything sucks and is doomed” book with Charlotte playing a significant part (it’s obvious she has to come back in a big way--"I don't think I've ever felt so envious in my life as I am of that girl Robin."), and then 7 the one to bring it all the way back to the kiss. Maybe 8. I hope not. (Of course, I also thought Book 5 would be the “Everything sucks and is doomed” book, so what do I know?)
> 
> 1-A little closer at the end, relatively happy ending  
> 2-Quite a bit closer at the end, fairly happy ending  
> 3-Big fucking setback, worst 3-year cliffhanger ever  
> 4-Significantly closer at the end, relatively happy ending  
> 5-Extremely close at the end, very happy ending  
> 6-Incredible fucking setback?, saddest ending? (would repeat the pattern of good, good, bad as in the first three books)  
> 7-Relationship saved, kiss!
> 
> Or maybe
> 
> 7-Relationship saved!  
> 8-Kiss!
> 
> We’ll find out!
> 
> Not sure if I’ll write the smut this ending clearly indicates. I might try. It would be separate from this story, like “As Advertised” is to “Course He Does”.


End file.
